Posted
by
timothyon Tuesday March 27, 2012 @12:07PM
from the hate-speech-join-the-crowd dept.

Motor writes "A UK judge has jailed a man for 56 days after he posted offensive comments on twitter about a footballer who had a heart attack during a game. He's also been thrown out of his university degree course weeks from graduating. His comments may have been offensive... but do they really justify a prison sentence and ruining his life?"

Can you really be imprisoned in the UK for posting something racially insensitive? Just because he wrote something about a soccer player people liked doesn't mean he should be arrested and sent to jail. What kind of wacky police state does the UK have that this is acceptable legal policy? Don't the police there have better things to do than be made to chase down Twitter trolls?

Oh granted, the guy is clearly an asshole (even if he was drunk when he posted them). But I really don't think you should be imprisoned just for being a racist. He should get kicked out of school, sure, because the school doesn't want to be affiliated with someone who does that shit. But a criminal sentence for saying something? You do realize that it isn't a very big step between that, and a criminal sentence for saying anything a majority of people don't like, right? Can't have a democratic government without freedom of speech, and that includes the right to say hateful things, for good or for ill.

I realize the UK doesn't have laws protecting what he did. I'm saying maybe it should, because not having them is worse than this guy not going to jail, in the long run.

There are some important differences - the foreigners held by the UK during the Gulf War were allowed to leave the country if they wished (a few chose to do so). In the U.S., interned foreigners are not given that choice.

The other difference is that the British courts already ruled in 2004 that internment of foreigners was incompatible with human rights laws, so the kind of internment that you are referring to is no longer possible. The U.S. courts have not made any similar rulings. Wikipedia: [wikipedia.org]

"A series of legal challenges were made in respect of the powers and processes established under the ATCSA and on December 16 2004, the Law Lords ruled that the powers of detention conferred by Part 4 of ATCSA were incompatible with the UK's obligations under the European Convention on Human Rights. The Court ruled by a majority of 8–1 that the purported derogation was not authorised by Article 15 of the European Convention on Human Rights since the measures taken could not rationally be held to be "strictly required by the exigencies of the situation", and were also discriminatory contrary to Article 14 of the Convention.

The ruling could be summed up as follows:

No detention pending deportation had lasted for more than seven days, let alone three years.
The law was unjustifiably discriminatory. What if a British citizen was also suspected of terrorism which required that they be detained indefinitely without trial? There was no way to do it.
There was no observable state of emergency threatening the life of the nation. No other European country which had experience far more severe crises had declared such a state of emergency over such a long time period, and certainly without anyone noticing."

And let's put this into the proper perspective. This man insuted another man. He did NOT initiate actual coercion (theft, fraud, physical force) or threat thereof. He simply insulted another man.

Government, on the other hand, has clearly initiated coercion (actual physical force) against this man, the insensitive asshole.

A real crime needs both an aggressor (the initiator of coercion) and a victim (the recipient of coercion). The real crime should be perfectly clear by now. The victim is the insensitive asshole, and the aggressor is government.

A real crime needs both an aggressor (the initiator of coercion) and a victim (the recipient of coercion). The real crime should be perfectly clear by now. The victim is the insensitive asshole, and the aggressor is government.

Post-WW2, we live in modern regulatory states. These penalize, and sometimes criminalize, regulatory infractions. Deliberate failure to pay taxes, for example, or deliberately structuring your transactions to avoid anti-money-laundering techniques, or driving a vehicle without a license.

We are a democracy in the UK. If the people don't like the law banning "incitement to racial hatred", we get rid of it.

The freedom of speech argument is bogus. I'm fairly sure that the US has laws against slander, libel, shouting "fire!" in a crowded subway when there is none, advertising medicine as cure for cancer when there is no evidence, etc etc.

I am not an English lawyer but wife is. She pointed out to me that England has a long history of civil peace (our last revolution was in the 1640s), a legal system that has been copied by many countries throughout the world and is the first choice for foreign companies and Russian oligarchs [ft.com] to have their cases heard. English law must be doing something right.

We are a democracy in the UK. If the people don't like the law banning "incitement to racial hatred", we get rid of it.

There is no real democracy without freedom of speech. When you aren't allowed to discuss your point of view, how are you going to discuss politics? How are you going to get your standpoint implemented when you aren't allowed to talk about them in a campaign?

But you're assuming that every topic should be on the table, and that democratic representation of even the most distasteful viewpoints is a good thing.

Personally, I'm not sure that the health of a country suffers if the likes of the far-right aren't democratically represented. If anything the US demonstrates the problem - the fact it allowed for such open freedom of speech is why it's so backwards on things like equality of race and sexuality compared to many European countries.

So great, the KKK, Westborough and co can preach their hate, is the US really better for it? Is your democracy more healthy? Are minorities better represented? Is equality better achieved? I don't think the answer is yes to any of these things in the US.

Sometimes it's just about being pragmatic, rather than fantasising about a mystical democracy where everyone can think for themselves, no one is influenced by propaganda, and everyone respects everyone else no matter what their physical features or beliefs.

It's hard getting the balance right for sure, and things are far from perfect here in the UK. There's the ever present danger of it swaying too much towards censorship, but I'm not convinced that danger is any worse than the danger of swaying the other way which causes numerous problems in the US with hate groups openly spouting their propaganda. The level of homophobia, xenophobia and even racism, and sexism to a degree deemed acceptable in mainstream US political debate for example is quite sickening and certainly creates an atmosphere less pleasant to minorities who have done nothing wrong, in a similar way restrictions on hate speech create an atmosphere unpleasant to those who wish to preach hate. Personally I know which group I think is more deserving of suffering that unpleasantness, and I'd wager it's much more preferable and beneficial to society in general that it is the hate speakers that suffer that atmosphere, rather than the targets of such hate speak.

I'm not a lawyer either, but I do know that Britain has a rather sordid reputation as a venue for libel tourism. People have been using our legal system to go after someone else for libel when neither party has any affiliation with the UK. The US has actually had to pass laws barring U.S. courts from enforcing libel judgments issued in foreign courts against U.S. residents, if the speech would not be libellous under American law, largely because so many unscrupulous people have tried to get around the protections offered by the First Amendment by using Britain as a legal venue.

Private insurance firms requiring them for young drivers in return for a reduced rate of insurance? Sure, but that's the case in the US, Europe, etc as well.

Seriously?

Which insurance company in the US requires people to put black box trackers in cars...even young drivers?

That's new to me...never heard that one before.

No UK companies require it either. Some are trialling policies which are cheaper, the conditions being you have a black box. If you don't want one then get a policy without a discount. From what I've heard most "black box" policies are brought by parents who provide a car and insurance for their kids anyway.

Our "massive youth gang problems" are mostly fat youths hanging around talking loudly, after 6PM, and smoking cigarettes in public places. They are not hazing each other, and intimidating whole neighbourhoods. Of course, our media like to pretend we have major league violence on every street corner, but with murder rate of about 1 per day for the whole country (of which over 90% are solved) with a population of about 25% or yours, it is probably not as bad as you think.

Can't have a democratic government without freedom of speech, and that includes the right to say hateful things, for good or for ill.

Kettle, meet pot. You're living in a country without freedom of speech right now. Look at what Homeland Security did to the Occupiers: Tanks, tear gas, mass arrests under cover of darkness, secret courts, deportation, just to name a few of the many creative things they did to punish the people who excercised their "freedom of speech". But there are many more examples, if you're one of those people that found that groundswell of democracy offensive and would prefer a more organized movement with a nice corpo

Uh, that wasn't DHS, that was local police beating up on hippies. They've been doing that since there have been hippies. It's wrong, but that's a local issue to be look at by the Feds once it gets close to violation of civil rights.

Anyone who says this should be made to do a 4 week mandatory tour of the world, looking for this mecca of free speech that they seem to imagine exists. The US is among the top countries in the world regarding free speech, and countries with any sort of free speech are in the minority.

Go talk with the billions in India, Russia, and China about free speech and right to protest, and then contemplate that North America and Western Europe may have problems but are a far sight better than what about 70% of the w

As a UK citizen, I have to question the sanity of this judgement. The gentleman in question is suspended from Swansea University at present (and, of course, unable to attend as he is in jail). He has admitted being very drunk when he tweeted. He has admitted initially claiming that his twitter account had been hacked after realising what he had done.

It is hardly a good use of a prison place, or cost effective, or a deterrent to put a drunk student who has done something stupid in jail. If we did that to every drunk stupid student just in Swansea, we'd have jails overflowing even more than they are now, every night of the week.

A long period of Community service and a requirement to do a meaningful race relations awareness course and, perhaps, a ban from social networks and alcohol would have been more than sufficient. Jail? It serves no useful purpose in this case and is ridiculous, and I say that as someone who is usually for longer prison sentences for proper (meaning violent) offenders.

It now transpires that in fact, what I've just written, if it is considered to criticise the judiciary, may well be breaking the UK Law: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-17522730 [bbc.co.uk]
Now I hate Peter Hain as much as the next man, but that's law's more of an ass than he is.

Yes, it does. That's precisely what it means: that the government won't punish you for expressing an opinion. If it meant anything less than that, it'd be "freedom of speech as long as it's approved, otherwise you're going to prison" which even the most ruthless tyrants would be perfectly OK with. I mean, Vlad the Impaler would let you say anything you wanted that didn't bother him (and then impale you if you crossed the line).

Freedom of speech doesn't mean that society won't judge you for your words. It damn well means that the government shouldn't.

FFS, every time someone is punished for expressing a (racist, sexist, etc) opinion [...]

...the Constitution is shredded (assuming that the "someone" is subject to American law). I am perfectly free to say that I hate black people. You can say that women are stupid. The Westboro gang can say that God wants gays to burn in hell. Every single one of those are perfectly legal, protected, expressions of opinion that the government will not prosecute you for. That is what "freedom of speech" means.

It gets much more complicated when those opinions are accompanied by calls for violence. If I were to carry a sign saying "kill a black person today", I should expect to find myself explaining my thought process to a judge. I am perfectly within my rights to express happiness at another person's misfortunes, though.

To be clear, I'm speaking of legal rights, not societal tolerance. People saying things so utterly incompatible with a civil society should be corrected or shunned by the people around them. Sometimes, that may involve consequences as severe a company firing an employee who says things that reflect poorly on the company. That is entirely different from the government stepping in and prosecuting such speech, though.

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

Freedom of speech is extremely broad in the united states. You have the right to make offensive speech.

Judging from the two YouTube videos that scroll the tweets from his account, he has all the couth and social graces of a diarrhoetic yak, but I didn't see anything that was encouraging other people to commit violence against black people. Encouraging other people to commit violence against him, yes -- particularly with his lame "couldn't you tell I was just joking?" tweet -- but that's just being stupid. It wasn't until subsequent tweets that he even mentioned Muamba's race. I have to agree with Baloroth; kicked out of school for egregious conduct, yes, but "inciting racial hatred" is, I believe, out of proportion.

I mean, if you kill someone...they are dead. Does it matter really the reason you did it? I think not...the person is no more dead for being black/white/hispanic/chinese/gay that they would be if someone just got mad at them for banging their significant other while the killer was at work.

The crime is murder....not the thought behind it, or at least it shouldn't be. Motive? Sure, but that explains the murder it shouldn't give a certain race or sexual orientation 'special' status which makes it a worse crime and extended punishment.

Is it worse for a guy to kill a black guy because he's black....than for him to kill a white guy for any other reason in the world? If you think so....explain why please....both guys are equally as dead.

It's the implied threat to anyone else of the same race as the victim. If someone owes me money, and I kill them to send a warning to other people who owe me money that's a crime under things like RICO. If I kill a black person to send a warning to other black people then that's a hate crime.

Of course, if I randomly kill someone and he happens to be black, then that's not a hate crime, but it will probably be portrayed as one, which is why I can understand people thinking hate crimes are just beat-ups.

I have to disagree. Punishment should be only for the crime. A person tortured, and/or killed....will result just as brutallly tortured and/or dead no matter why that person was targeted.

The message sent by a crime like this is "If you dare to be gay here, we just might kill you." It's terrorism, in any reasonable sense of the word. The crime targets not just the person who is violently attacked, but anyone who shares that characteristic with the victim.

If a straight guy was in place of the gay guy you mentioned in your example...he would be just as tortured and then dead as the gay guy

No, if a straight guy was in place of the gay guy, he wouldn't have been tortured or dead, because the attackers WENT LOOKING FOR A GAY GUY TO TORTURE AND KILL. That's the whole fucking point.

I see no difference. He can yell at people all day on a street corner here in the US to take up arms and kill all Chinese babies. You really think that's going to incite people to actually do that? If that's the case in Briton you people have serious problems. No only is he protected in doinf it here, he'd be looked at as insane. I guess you guys as a people have the very real danger of scratching your heads and saying "You know, that fellow is making sense.", so the Gov. needs to protect you from that, apparently.

Different countries have different standards. Yes, you can be imprisoned for being a racist in the UK, but in the US, well, you can pretty much kill someone because they're black and it's OK as long as you thought they were up to no good at the time.

Last time I checked Zimmerman had not been arrested or charged with anything. The AC has a point because at least in Florida, murder is legal. Its not just a local police department, it's the entire "Stand your ground" law which makes it legal to murder anyone who's scary.

You can use deadly force against someone if a reasonable person would deem that that force is necessary to protect yourself. If you are scared by Jehovah's Witnesses and shoot one that comes to your door, it doesn't matter that you're scared of them.

He was in the protective environment of his car. He dialled 911, and all he had to offer by way of complain was that he looked funny, had a hoodie, and was looking around at houses whist he walked. He got out out of his car to follow Martin on foot, and the dispatcher told him not to. It's not that he stood his ground at all. He provoked an altercation by following an innocent, unarmed person and then shot him dead. That's murder, not self-defense, nor standing your ground.

As I understand it, the "stand your ground" law makes it legal to use lethal force if someone feels threatened even on public property.

You understand wrong. A typical "stand your ground" law makes it legal to use lethal force if a reasonable person (as decided by court/jury) has good reason to believe that they are under imminent threat of death or significant bodily harm. For example, the Florida statute in question:

"a person who is not engaged in an unlawful activity and who is attacked... has no duty to retreat and has the right to stand his or her ground and meet force with force, including deadly force if he or she reasonably believes it is necessary to do so to prevent death or great bodily harm."

If there are any doubts whatsoever about "reasonably believes" part, it goes to court, and jury decides under guidance from the judge. In this particular case, there are very significant doubts, and I don't think any jury would agree with the guy who pulled the trigger being reasonable given the circumstances (heck, several NRA figures have already noted that this is a classic case of inappropriately claimed "self-defense").

What's broken is the American justice system where the state can refuse to push charges against a potential murderer on such flimsy grounds as this, and in particular the fact that, clearly, this is being used to shield a police collaborator from prosecution.

I'm seeing reports that Zimmerman, when interviewed by police had a broken nose, and trauma to the back of the head, which does lend credence to his story that the kid attacked him physically, and with the whack on the head, possibly he was jumped from behind by the kid?

You must have also heard reports of Zimmerman leaving his car against the recommendation of the 911 operator with the intention of confronting Martin. So he picked a fight, and when he started to lose, he shot the kid.

Since we know that Zimmerman started the confrontation, why do we not assume that Martin was acting in his own self defense? He was the one who was minding his own business.

Unless Zimmerman observed Martin committing an actual crime, and he has made no such claim that I have heard, he had no right to confront him and should be held responsible for the result even if he was ultimately acting out of fear for his own life. In a similar vein, if someone is robbing a store, and the clerk pulls a gun, the robber can not shoot the clerk and then claim self defense.

I guess thoughtcrime is a word you guys have never heard of huh? Or the phrase "freedom of speech"? tell me, when the Mullahs are screaming "Death to the infidels!" in the mosques, do you drag them away? or is it a double standard like here in the USA? When you have blacks throwing words like "Cracka, white devil" around, do they get carted off? i bet they don't.

I understand that "go pick cotton" is racially insensitive, and that yelling that at someone with dark skin on the street could cause a bit of a stir, but I don't think it should merit jail time.

Hate speech laws should have to show some expectation of resulting in actual harm, for example calling people names shouldn't cross that line, calling on people to hurt/kill someone (or some group) could be a different category. I can see merit in outlawing the later (though it is still something that could be argue

There's a world of difference between "rightly frowned upon" and "put in jail for". It's the difference between a civilized free society and a totalitarian police state. Congratulations, Brits: you live in the latter.

Well there is an important difference, which is that the United States is at least nominally a constitutional republic, whereas the UK is a theocratic monarchy. Theocratic monarchies aren't exactly known for tolerance and freedom, although the UK does a better job with their theocratic monarchy than most other theocratic monarchies. The United States, for all its failings, is nowhere near a totalitarian society. It's okay to make such a comparison in jest, just so long as everyone knows you are joking.

Off topic (sorry mods) but:After the last slashdot discussion on this subject I re-read the novel and re-watched the film. What did I miss? Sure they were slightly different but I didn't see them in the chalk and cheese awesome and rubbish that most people seem to. I wouldn't have picked some of the actors that they did, but other than that i don't know what they should have done differently.I know on slashdot this sentiment will come across as flaimbait but it honestly isn't. Why the hatred for the film?

Yes, evidently you can. The US affords much broader protection for nearly all forms of speech then the UK, or nearly any other country.

But lets not start sucking each other's dicks just yet. For every thing the US gets right, it gets two things wrong.

Not to mention that the free speech rights most US citizens take for granted are under constant assault. They are tested in the courts constantly. When you read about something like this happening overseas you shouldn't think, "what a bunch of backwards idiots", you should think, "I better watch out or that sort of thing could start happening here too".

A UK judge has jailed a man for 56 days after he posted offensive comments on twitter about a footballer who had a heart attack during a game. He's also been thrown out of his university degree course weeks from graduating.

I'm surprised that, being a judge, he hadn't already graduated. Seems a bit political by the university anyway.

This took place in a country outside of the United States. They don't have the first amendment. If a person is guilty of "inciting racial hatred" and they admit to it, as is the case here, then they are punishable by local law.

But freedom of speech has always had limitations.The classic of example of limits on freedom of speech being you do not have the freedom to yell "FIRE" in a crowded cinema just to laugh and watch as everyone panics and tramples over each other to escape.Now should inciting racial hatred be in the same class of action as one likely to cause injury or death to others? In most situations I would hope that sane rational people would be annoyed by such incitement but not take it further. If however you have a situation where you say it's okay to pick on people - particularly people deemed vulnerable by society - then at some point you have to draw the line and say it's not okay. As a society/judicial system the UK has decided that it will put its foot down about these things because it wants to take a stand that racial abuse in all its forms is wrong. I don't see the problem with this.So let's argue that 56 days in jail is a bit extreme, let's perhaps argue that it wasn't that offensive to the person concerned (although I would argue I don't know what he could have said that was more offensive) but can we agree that there are some things that in some circumstances it is just wrong to say.

Article 12No one shall be subjected to arbitrary interference with his privacy, family, home or correspondence, nor to attacks upon his honour and reputation. Everyone has the right to the protection of the law against such interference or attacks.

Article 29(1) Everyone has duties to the community in which alone the free and full development of his personality is possible. (2) In the exercise of his rights and freedoms, everyone shall be subject only to such limitations as are determined by law solely for t

The UK is a lost cause. Unfortunately. They'll have to figure it out. I wish them luck. Meanwhile back at the home front, this is precisely why humanity must remain ever vigilant. If you don't fight and secure freedom for yourself and your children, it will be lost. The only way to re-obtain it is through bloodshed. Nobody ever wants it to come to that. Just a little known historical fact.

You're correct. The U.S. has such a thing as hate crime, and there's nothing to suggest that this man couldn't have been sued had he been a U.S. resident, but for any government to claim the power to enforce restrictions on speech is disturbing and exactly why the U.S. has the First Amendment in the first place.

Nowhere in the article is it said that the student has been "thrown out"; in actuality he's suspended pending the internal disciplinary process (as is, as far as I know, standard whenever a student is arrested).
[For what it's worth I happen to be a postgrad at Swansea]

Not just this story but other stories about censorship of the internet & television channels, indicate to me that free speech is no longer a right in the UK. That's a shame because that's where the right was first re-born in the modern world.

It's never been a codified right in the vein of the US First Amendment, other than through the European Convention on Human Rights - which allows for plenty of restrictions [wikipedia.org], including those "for the prevention of disorder or crime, for the protection of health or morals, [or] for the protection of the reputation or rights of others", all of which could be argued to be related to "inciting racial hatred".

Liam Stacey was not arrested for offensive comments. He was found guilty of inciting racial hatred.

He wasn't thrown out of university; he is suspended pending an investigation.

The reality of freedom of speech (at least the US concept) is that it is not consequence free speech. While the article does not mention any actual harm committed through racial insensitivity, I can only assume that someone was threatened and that the threat was taken seriously through Liam's postings. If no actual harm was committed, society does not benefit by having someone go to prison.

Liam Stacey was not arrested for offensive comments. He was found guilty of inciting racial hatred.

He was found guilty of inciting racial hatred because of the offensive comments he made. That means he was arrested for making offensive comments.

The reality of freedom of speech (at least the US concept) is that it is not consequence free speech.

It does mean free from legal consequences, if it is to mean anything at all.

While the article does not mention any actual harm committed through racial insensitivity, I can only assume that someone was threatened and that the threat was taken seriously through Liam's postings.

Why can you only assume that? There are lots of other things that you could assume, and they're likely to be a lot closer to the truth. I can only assume that the UK is an island full of big wusses who can't stand a little name calling.

Why should being an asshole be punished by prison time, if no one got hurt. Why not just ignore the assholes? Considering that writing on your Facebook or Twitter account isn't really too different from saying it in a crowded room, maybe everyone should walk around recording what everyone else says. 90% of the country would end up in jail.

If the guy is a paying student the university can suspend him if they think so, but if it's a college funded by the taxpayers they shouldn't have the right to choose between students. There are people convicted of murder studying and getting degrees in jail but a guy guilty of speechcrime can get suspended?

Indeed, the term "football" may have either come from the fact that feet could be used to progress the ball, or because it was played on foot. It is not known which is true, though. The one thing that can EASLY be dismissed, though, is that football means that ONLY the feet can progress the ball, given that even some of the precursors to soccer/association football allowed players to use their hands, as well.

I find the argument that using the internet is more dangerous than actual speak because more people can "hear" it a bit silly.These laws seem to have been created to prevent immanent violence based on racial hate on the street, but because the internet records information it is much easier to prosecute these type of "crimes".

No wonder the news article didn't quote any tweets. There's nothing to quote. Actually reporting on what was written would probably just get people angry about the response, which is probably not their intention.